Potty Party

When it comes to potty training, I’m intentionally not reading any books on the subject and not asking for advice from those who’ve gone before me. If I do, I’ll start comparing our potty training to everyone else’s. “But Jennifer Mableton’s kid potty trained in one day!” or “How could that stupid kid from the Y who doesn’t even know his own name potty train himself by age 2?” or “The book said he shouldn’t have any accidents after three days! Why is my kid still peeing on the floor?”

So you see, it could get ugly.

All I’ve done so far is have Leo sit on his little potty while he watches a TV show. I figure, if he drinks enough and then sits there long enough, he’ll have to go eventually. And then, once he does, he’ll get a sticker and see how awesome it is.

But somehow he could drink cups full of apple juice and still not go. Amazing.

So the other day, I had an idea: A potty party.

I totally made it up on the fly. I hung up this “Happy Birthday” banner since it looked festive and he can’t read. The yellow sign says “Leo! Go!” and brought bubbles into the bathroom:

 

 

 

When he got up from his nap I told him, “We’re going to have a potty party! You can invite three stuffed animals to come with you!” He chose chicken, bear and Bevo. Then he asked, “Will John be there?”

The basic idea of the potty party was that we would make the bathroom look and feel really exciting. He drank a juice box and then every 15 minutes we’d go in the bathroom, blow bubbles and then sit on the potty. He’d try to go and then we’d play until the timer went off again, telling us it was time to go back into the potty party. The party only lasted an hour but A LOT went on.

Here are the # of times we did the following:

 

Played Duck Duck Goose: three

Did a potty party conga line around the house: two (I made up this chant “pee-pee in the potty, poo-poo in the potty”)

Peed in the potty: two

Peed on the rug: one

Pooped on the stairs: one

Drank juice boxes: three

Received stickers: two

Earned lollipops: two

Ate snack: one

Read books: two

Ran through bubbles: four

Had stuffed animals use the potty: three

Cleaned up accidents: two

Changed big boy underwear: two

 

 

All in all, I’d say it was a successful (although weird) party. Leo was very excited to show Frank the potty party when he got home that night.

Perhaps MY methods will be featured in a book on the subject one day!